


My Sweetheart's Piano is Rat-Filled

by EveryoneHasAmnesia



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Blood, Discussion of Cannibalism, M/M, Plotting a murder, Post-Canon, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Fall (Hannibal), but you know what show this is, discussion of attempted suicide, i don't think will intended them to live after the cliff i truly don't but surpriiiiiise shawty, injuries, talking head syndrome whoops, technically also attempted murder, the negotiation of a relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-31
Updated: 2021-01-31
Packaged: 2021-03-18 06:48:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29114025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EveryoneHasAmnesia/pseuds/EveryoneHasAmnesia
Summary: ... and mine is infested with bugs. The music we make is unnatural, but it sounds just like falling in love. --riodoeseverything, TikTok
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35
Collections: Hannibal Flash Fic #004





	My Sweetheart's Piano is Rat-Filled

“So this is where you bring me?” Will grinds the sentence out through his short, rough breaths. He can’t catch his breath, even though he’s been laying in the shadow of the piano for several minutes. His throat is raw, and he can’t see what Hannibal is doing to him beneath his collarbone. Every time he tries to lift his head Hannibal stops him. “Dolarhyde got to go to a cliffside retreat.”

“I’m not taking you to a cliff again,” Hannibal says. He doesn’t shift to look Will in the eye; he’s busy with whatever he’s dragged from the first aid kit he’d taken from inside the piano’s broken frame.

“Fool me once,” Will says, and finds he can’t finish it. He swallows, tastes pennies all through his mouth, and is too breathless to gag. 

Hannibal looms into his field of vision. He’s pale, and the saltwater in his short hair is drying into stiff spikes. How much blood has he lost? Will doesn’t know how the man’s still moving. He should be--they both should be--

“You must speak,” Hannibal says. His voice is rough with exertion but his words as composed as ever. “If you lose consciousness, there is a high probability that you will die.” 

“And my odds otherwise are…?” Will’s not in a lot of pain. That’s a pretty bad sign, all things considered. 

“Being recalculated by the second,” Hannibal answers. He leaves Will’s field of view, and Will looks around the room they’re in. He doesn’t remember most of the trip here; there was a car, but he barely remembers it. The car they’d arrived in, the police cruiser. He remembers falling. He remembers the kiss before they hit the water. He doesn’t know where they are. 

It’s a large enough residence, but it’s completely overrun with debris, destruction, graffiti. There are a few crates lying around, scorch marks of a fire on the floor. The air is heavy with dust and the rank stench of rat piss. 

“Will? What did I just say?” 

“To talk.” Will blinks and has to fight to open his eyes again. “So no cliffs. What did you expect, really? I’ve tried to kill you so many times before…” 

“I’ve never held it against you,” Hannibal murmurs. Something twists in Will’s body, and he cries out at the shock of pain. Hannibal doesn’t stop. He speaks smoothly through Will’s agony. “I did, of course, miscalculate this time. I didn’t think you’d want to go with me. What would that have done, Will? Who would have won then?” 

“Everybody.” 

“Not you and I.” 

“Everybody else in the world. Molly. Jack. Hell, Bedelia.”

“You don’t think your wife would rather have you alive?” 

“My ex-wife,” Will says. The pain is receding again, but not as much as before. He feels the cold setting in, biting at his fingers and toes. He feels his toes? A better sign. 

“My condolences on the death of your marriage,” Hannibal says. Will strains himself to lift his head, and he can see the suggestion of a smile playing on Hannibal’s lips. 

“Fuck you,” Will says. Hannibal chuckles. 

“So you threw us off the cliff to save them. You could have just pushed me.” 

“No, I couldn’t. They’re not safe with me.” 

Hannibal leans back into Will’s field of view. “I’ve done what I can,” he says. “It’s up to you now. If you’re still on the knife’s edge of suicidality, you should know that there is demonstrable proof that giving up hastens death. Make up your mind, or your indecisiveness may actually be more definite than you think.” 

“And what about you?” Will asks. 

“I think I will live,” Hannibal says. He leans over and stretches out, grunting slightly with pain as he lays down. “It’s a good bullet wound. I am a healthy man. Good responses, good cardiovascular health. Fortunate for us both that I stayed fit in prison. And was an accomplished swimmer for several decades.” 

Will turns his head. They’re together, side by side, on the disgusting carpet of an abandoned house. “Did you know it would be like this?” Will asks. He means them, the two of them, but Hannibal glances around at the room. 

“Not at all. But I haven’t been able to clean it in three years. I suspect it’s become the hangout of teens and vandals. Extremely rude.” 

“Are you going to eat them?” 

“Maybe. If they break in while we are both recovering, I’ll have little choice but to kill them. And then… if it is teens… Oh, don’t look disgusted. I’ve served you lamb before. How old do you think it was, from the point of view of a sheep?”

Will shakes his head and stops when it makes the room spin. “I don’t want random teens as a first meal.” 

“Then what?” 

“Bedelia,” Will says. It comes straight from the back of his mind, the scheming part that is often quiet and still, but only ever feigning sleep. 

“Why?” Hannibal asks. 

“Why don’t you want it to be her?” 

“You asked me to kill Jack Crawford once. To prove certain things to you. Is this another test?” 

“That doesn’t answer my question.” 

“You haven’t answered mine.” 

Will shifts, trying to get comfortable, and sends ribbons of pain through his chest. He can feel how hard the ground is beneath him, and that’s a blessing. “It’s not a test, so much as… You won’t take me to a cliffside. Alright. Well, I won’t let you have your back-up wife.” 

“Bedelia loathes me,” Hannibal says. 

“That’s just how you like us.” 

“Are we going to eat Molly, too? Little Wally?” 

“No.” 

“That’s not fair, then. You’re allowed a back-up wife?”

“Maybe she could be, if I’d met her first. If I was still the man I was before the…” 

“Yes?” 

“The drugs and the manipulation. Before I found out what I’m capable of. What I like to do. If I had never… Become, I could have had her. All the dogs I could want. A son. A happy life.” 

“You would never have known yourself.” 

“I knew everything about myself that I wanted to know. I wasn’t looking for any more surprises, whether that’s… liking men, or, or liking…” 

“But then you would never have known me.” 

Will huffs out a thin laugh. “Yeah. I suppose I wouldn’t have. Hannibal Lecter, the 8th wonder of the world.” 

Hannibal smiles. “Are you signing up to see the other seven?” 

“If I survive the night. Do you think I will?” 

Hannibal reaches over. His hand brushes Will’s. “I have used all my considerable skill, and decent first aid supplies. But there could always be something broken that I can’t see. This isn’t time for exploratory surgery. It’s in God’s hands now.”

“Then I’m going to live,” Will says, and rolls painfully onto his side. Hannibal presses close, eyes wide with surprise, trying to roll him flat. 

Will bites him, hard, on the cheek. Not as hard as he could have, and they both know it. When Hannibal pulls away, Will releases him, and then leans in for a kiss. 

“Tell me, Will, do you believe God will save you?” 

“I believe that God loves church collapses and natural disasters,” Will says. His head is swimming, and he doesn’t fight as Hannibal eases them both back. His head rests on the doctor’s shoulder as they spoon on the hard, dirty floor. “Entertainment wise, we’re worth more to Him alive than dead.” 

He feels Hannibal’s whole body shake with his laughter. Then the cold dark carries him away, and he has to wait to see if he’s going to wake up again or not.


End file.
